Milking this Lesson Idea (Beginners) on Care of Magical Creatures

Lawrence Marsh

November 24, 2021 11:19 AM

Milking this Lesson Idea (Beginners) by Lawrence Marsh

OOC: CW: Milking of animals that may be viewed as traumatic. BIC:

It had become a tradition. This lesson plan was a tradition, of sorts. Though Lawrence was not always one for traditions, especially when his parents' idea of tradition was concerned, he rather liked this one. Jackalopes had become a huge success. Though slightly more dangerous than puffskeins, and more pron for some students to grow attached, they’d been able to help one of badlands sanctuaries turn around it’s jackalope population. Though Lawrence shuddered to think what those jackalopes were mimicking once they got back into the wild.

Still, it was helpful not only for the children, but for the population as well. After all the reason for Lawrence to have started the Lesson was to bring in a bit of the North American continental flavor. Eschewing the European tropes of teaching was something he tried, being non-European himself, to do at every turn, sometimes to better success than others.

Today though was a bit different. Today was the milking lesson, and that was...never an easy task with the younger students.

As his students came in Lawrence smiled and nodded. Once everyone was at their seats, he began.

“Good morning class. You’ve all been doing well with your Jackalopes, and though normally I would have you make sure the animals were cared for and properly fed, today we are going to actually see why even if you don’t love your Jackalope, you should want to make sure they were protected. Every student who has a female Jackalope, can you raise your hand?”

Lawrence waited to make sure that every student who did indeed have a female Jackalope had raised their hand.

“Perfect. Now, please select a student to partner with who does not have a female Jackalope. One of the student’s who did not raise their hand. And then sit down next to each other at a table together.”

Lawrence waited as the noise of students standing up and switching seats crescendo and then subsided again.

“Ok. Now that you are paired and seated. When I finish explaining today’s lesson one of you will get up to get your Jackalope and the other will come up to the front and get a,” Lawrence pulled out a baster “a baster and a small jar. Now, the student whose jackalope you are working with today, will sit and talk to the jackalope, feed it, if necessary sing to it. Whatever you need to do to keep it calm while the other student milks the animal. To do this, you will take the baster, press down on the ball so air goes out, attach the end of the baster to a nipple and slowly, slowly, let the air come back in. There will be some, not much, milk that comes out. You will transfer this to the container. You will do this to all the jackalopes nipples. Once you are done, you will bring the milk up to the table. For homework you’ll then write a short, two to five paragraph, paper on why Jackalope milk is good, and what it can be used for.”

“If there are no questions, please be sure to be gentle with your Jackalopes, they are known to be protective after all. I’ll be walking around if you have any question

OOC: Some background on Jackalopes:

https://harrypotter.fandom.com/wiki/Jackalope
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jackalope
If you want to know more about Jackalope milk, it can be found here: https://mythology.net/mythical-creatures/jackalope/
https://www.legendsofamerica.com/wy-jackalope/

And, where did I come up with the idea of how to milk a Jackalope you ask? Surprising amount of research led to this:
http://floridahillbilly.com/rabbit-milk-cheese/

Subthreads:

This should be interesting by Iris Cobb with Amethyst Brockert

All right by Liesl Brockert

Is this really safe? by Phil Carson with Tissena Randall

41 Lawrence Marsh Milking this Lesson Idea (Beginners) 1462 1 5

Iris Cobb

November 25, 2021 8:17 AM

This should be interesting by Iris Cobb

Iris liked Care of Magical Creatures, and she loved her fuzzy little Norma-Jean. Well, Norma-Jean wasn't actually that little, but that was okay. So she took a seat in class and waited to learn what they would be doing today. As instructed, she raised her hand since she had a female jackalope, and looked around to find someone who didn't have their hand raised. Once that had been sorted out, she settled back down to listen to the rest of the lesson.

They were milking the jackalopes? That made sense, if they needed it on a regular basis, it was probably about time. Although, they were generally wild animals, so they wouldn't be like cows or anything.

She went to retrieve her Jackalope. "Hi Norma-Jean!" She greeted the critter, "How are you doing today?" Talking to your jackalope was very important. She undid the latch and lifted Norma-Jean out. "Are you ready to get milked? I think it'll be good." She kept up the stream of calming chatter as she made her way back to the table.

"Okay, here we are." She set the critter on the table and looked at her partner. "This is Norma-Jean, jumping-bean, introduce yourself to her, then we can get started."

2 Iris Cobb This should be interesting 1526 0 5

Liesl Brockert

December 01, 2021 4:12 PM

All right by Liesl Brockert

Liesl had never been big on the whole Yuletide season. It did, after all, immediately follow Halloween as everyone tended to completely ignore Thanksgiving and go right from taking down Halloween decorations to putting up Yule ones, replacing all the skulls and bats and snakes that the Teppenpaw loved so much with the Yule decorations that were far less her style. She felt like herself at Halloween, at Yule not so much. After all, Halloween decorations were how she decorated all year round.

That said, she had a pretty good holiday break. She had gotten to see Uncle Cory and her little sister Krisalyn again-the only people in her family who seemed truly happy to see her, although her cousins and Aunt Amy and her grandparents had been too, she supposed. Plus, she'd gotten some nice presents, in particular a new skull from her favorite uncle!

It was a wooden skull that Uncle Cory had gotten from Cuba. One of his best friends, Raúl,was Cuban American and his whole family still lived there except his parents, who had emigrated to the US before he was born. According to Uncle Cory, Raúl didn't really like going to visit his family by himself and since he wasn't married, Uncle Cory and their other friend, Neal, went down there to support him.

Liesl thought this was amazing of her uncle and another reason to admire him. She wanted to be a friend like that. She wanted to be someone who supported people when they had a difficult time even if it meant going to another country. Which was interesting since the two people she thought of as her friends, were both foreign or at least foreign-ish. Verdillia was from Wales and Hans, though he lived in Utah on a snake ranch-the lucky duck, or maybe she should say the lucky snake-was originally from Germany. Never mind Germany though, Liesl really wanted to visit Hans on the snake ranch.

She also admired the fact that Uncle Cory had found the shyest, most awkward kid in his class-Raúl not Neal-and befriended him. The first year wanted to do that too,although she thought her cousin Christopher might be that kid. Well, still, that meant she should reach out to him even more. She also wanted to like, help others who were hurting and needed a friend. Plus, Liesl wanted to become closer to her roommate and get to know her better.

Professor Marsh began the lesson. Generally speaking, Liesl sort of liked this class, but she wished he'd do creepier animals. Of course, she was starting to get attached to her jackalope, Reaper. It was sort of like what happened with Eyeballs, her cat. She had wanted a snake, because snakes were awesome, but Mother wouldn't let her have one, so she'd gotten a cat instead and now she loved Eyeballs-and she was starting to be attached to Reaper too.

Unfortunately, Reaper was male so today, Liesl wouldn't be working with him. This actually bothered her more than the fact that she had to do the milking. She petted his head and said "See you later." to him, then approached one of the people who'd raised their hand as having a female jackalope. "Can I work with you?" The Teppenpaw asked.

11 Liesl Brockert All right 1537 0 5

Phil Carson

December 02, 2021 9:38 PM

Is this really safe? by Phil Carson

"Hey, Mystique," Phil cooed softly to his jackalope as he peered in at her. He opened her cage door and gave her a light petting before clasping it closed again and heading over to his seat. It had been hard naming her, but he'd eventually decided Mystique's ability to mimic the voice of any person perfectly gave her the edge over any other character he could think of. Also she was most often portrayed as a villain, and he figured that was kind of appropriate too, for a creature that could be much more dangerous than it looked when provoked.

The professor began the lesson, and while Phil wasn't sure he loved Mystique, he was quite fond of her, and didn't think he needed any extra reasons to make sure she was protected. Still, he raised his hand when asked to identify himself as a student caring for a female jackalope.

He needed to find somebody who hadn't raised their hand, so he looked around and spotted a person with their hand down just in front of him. He moved his chair around his desk so that he was sitting next to them. He thought he knew their name earlier in the year, but he'd forgotten it. "Hi, I'm Phil," he whispered, figuring it was just as likely they'd forgotten his as he'd forgotten theirs. He whispered because he was not sure if they were allowed to talk yet. "And my jackalope is a lady named Mystique."

The professor soon began speaking again, Phil began to look increasingly appalled. He was glad his job was just to try to keep Mystique calm while this indignity was visited upon her.

Then the instructions were over and Phil said, "I guess I'll go get Mystique then." He went up front to fetch the jackalope, and murmured apologetically, "I don't think you're gonna like this lesson, little lady. But come on. Let's get it over with." He collected some food bits on the way back then settled into his seat with Mystique on his partner's table. For now, he just petted her and tried to get her into a good mood by chatting with her. He'd save the food for when the unpleasantness started.

"Ready?" he asked, as much to Mystique as to his partner once they returned. "Here's some lettuce, Mystique, you like this." As she began munching, he looked over at his partner and nodded that they should start.

1 Phil Carson Is this really safe? 1536 0 5

Amethyst Brockert

December 15, 2021 2:33 PM

If by interesting, you mean completely disgusting, than yes. by Amethyst Brockert

If it weren't for Uncle Eustace-and Topaz, but mostly Uncle Eustace-Amethyst's break would have been amazing. She got gifts-and she was definitely a person who liked getting gifts,especially fancy and expensive ones-and got to see her family and get a break from school work and classes. Being able to do basically whatever she wanted was such a nice feeling.

Plus, Amethyst had gotten to do things like go to the spa with her mother, aunts, sisters and female cousins including Alma and Libby, who were deemed old enough for their first mani-pedis . Although thankfully, Topaz had stayed home to do taxidermy or study or plot world domination or whatever thing that the Aladren alumna did. Amethyst really didn't care what her older sister did so long as it didn't affect her or others that she cared about. Honestly, she would have preferred Topaz stay at school, but unfortunately, this was an issue where she didn't get her way. And Amethyst so loved to get her way. Still, she was glad that her older sister had no interest in going to the spa and therefore had not come with them.

Aunt Helena had also not come along, choosing instead to stay home with baby Honora who was definitely too young for mani-pedis and facials and other spa treatments. Even though they had a nanny-because that was just part of being purebloods of their social class, they had house-elves and sometimes human servants like nannies and tutors-Aunt Helena rarely let her new daughter out of her sight which made the nanny seem a tad extraneous. Amethyst wondered if the reason was really just because her aunt had wanted a baby for so long and was happy to finally have one or because she was worried Uncle Eustace would do something to Honora if she wasn't there to protect her. Part of the Crotalus wanted him to try something, just so Aunt Helena would harm him in defense of her daughter but she doubted her aunt would be capable of such things.Aunt Helena was much too beaten down to stand up for her daughter or herself or anyone else.

Sometimes, the idea of ending up like her aunt terrified Amethyst. However, what was more likely was that Sapphire would end up in that position. The younger Crotalus was of a different type. For all her outward girly princessy behavior, she felt she was made of stronger stuff than her older sister. Of course, the sixth year had been beaten down too, by Topaz, ever since she was born, more or less. Amethyst had had to deal with less of Topaz's crap than Sapphire had.

And it had made the older girl a perfect target for men like Uncle Eustace who were domineering and controlling because, well, she was easy to dominate and control. Amethyst had probably herself done exactly that to Sapphire, unintentionally, even though she was four years younger than her sister. She did it to Chris too at times and felt sort of guilty for doing that to both of them now that she thought about it.

On the plus side, it seemed that Allegra, who Amethyst also used to worry about the same way she did about Sapphire, wasn't going to end up like their aunt. Allegra's boyfriend, Josh, was more or less exactly what the Crotalus alumna needed. Soft and gentle with her, but somehow, he seemed like he'd be strong enough to stand up to Topaz if need be. After all, he'd managed to handle and pass the presumably thorough interrogation he'd likely received from every member of Allegra's immediate family unit minus Uriah. Honestly, all Josh would have to get the child's approval was ply him with sweets and not by an obvious psycho but the rest of them, in particular, Esme, were a bit tougher.

Amethyst listened as Professor Marsh began the lesson, looking around as he asked those with female jackalopes to raise their hands. The second year's jackalope, Prince,was male so she joined Iris who had a female.

Then Professor Marsh held up the baster and gave them their instructions. A look of complete and utter horror settled on the Crotalus's face. She had to do what ? Ewwww! Ewewewewewew! Ew!

She looked at her friend's jackalope and forced a smile and some...pleasantness into her voice. She could do this, she wasn't without acting abilities, since acting was basically a form of manipulation, a skill she'd honed just fine. Plus, she had nothing against jackalopes, she just found the idea of milking one completely revolting."Hi Norma-Jean, I'm Amethyst of- ." Out of sheer habit, the traditional pureblood introduction had almost fell out of her mouth but she stopped herself in time, as it would be a bit silly to do that with a jackalope. "I'm Amethyst." She reluctantly grabbed the baster and went to attach it to a nipple, dropping the act and allowing a look of sheer terror to return to her face.

11 Amethyst Brockert If by interesting, you mean completely disgusting, than yes. 1532 0 5

Iris Cobb

December 19, 2021 5:34 PM

Oh it's not that bad by Iris Cobb

Iris scritched Norma-Jean behind the ears comfortingly as Amethyst introduced herself. She giggled slightly as her friend and roommate decided not to go through with the full blown introduction. Iris did give her a supporting smile though during the process, to let her know that she was doing fine. Once Amethyst got a hold of the baster, her friend's entire countenance changed. Well, here was one place where she was more comfortable than the Brockert girl.

"It's fine Amethyst," Iris tried to comfort and reassure her. "It ain't gunna hurt her none. I've done this sort of thing plenty back home," she paused a moment to think. "Though, that was mostly with goats. Can't say I've done a rabbit before.. or a jackalope in this case. But it's all the same. Norma-Jean ain't gunna mind at all, are you Norma?" She nuzzled the jackalope's nose and face affectionately. She reached over and grabbed one of Norma-Jean's favorite treats. That got the jackalope's attention. "Besides, without any young'uns around, you're probably doing her a favor." Iris wasn't one hundred percent on how that all exactly worked with wild critters, but it sounded good and would hopefully ease some of Amethyst's uncomfortableness with the situation.

Iris nodded at her friend, "Go ahead, give it a go. Don't think about it to much, from the looks of things you're making it way worse inside your head than it actually is."

2 Iris Cobb Oh it's not that bad 1526 0 5

Tissena Randall

December 23, 2021 10:57 PM

Milk is pretty neutral in terms of safety. So are nipples. Probably fine. by Tissena Randall

Tissena wasn't terribly attached to her jackalope but then . . . she wasn't terribly attached to anyone or anything. She had made precisely one friend and they were close enough that she did truly feel comfortable labeling them that way, but it was hard to say whether they were about to be lifelong friends or anything like that. Still, Claire was nice and had gotten Tissena a gift for the holidays so Tissena had made her a mechanical self-stirring cauldron attachment. They usually had to do all their own stirring in class and Tissena couldn't beat the magical ones available on the market but this one was cool because you just clipped it onto the side, spun a dial to adjust the interval, speed, and arc size, and then let it go. So long as the attached spoon was usable for the potion you were making, it was perfect. She had dissolved a few spoons in prototypes but that was in the past. And in the present, they were turkey bastering jackalope nips. So that was a big day for sure.

One of her classmates, a boy named Phil, approached and introduced himself. It was good he did or Tissena would've just thought a boy who was her classmate sat with her. She smiled and introduced herself as well, glad to meet someone who understood that there were many more important things to get stored in the brain than people's names.

"Blob is a boy," she said, although that was pretty obvious since she hadn't raised her hand. "Thanks for pairing up with me."

She got a jar and baster while Phil got Mystique - great name, 10/10 - and when she returned, she noticed that he seemed a bit nervous. She couldn't really blame him, partly because he was a boy and thus had probably never considered the possibility of milk coming out of his nipples, but also because turkey basters seemed like a bad approach. Baby jackalopes couldn't possibly suck the same way as this system, although they also couldn't siphon the milk off into a jar . . . hmmmm.

"Do you think there's a better way to do this?" she asked as she attached the baster to the first nipple and Phil gave Mystique some lettuce. The first one could be the tester. The control. Then, they could experiment with more efficient methods as they went on. "Why not do it by hand even?" she suggested, watching the first few drops of milk make their way into the tube.

22 Tissena Randall Milk is pretty neutral in terms of safety. So are nipples. Probably fine. 1534 0 5